China Post 80th Anniversary of the Victory of the Long March by the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army

CHINA POST in 2016 issued a series of first day cover stamps to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the victory of the Long March by the Chinese Workers' and Peasants' Red Army.

The Long March  was a military retreat undertaken by the Red Army of the Communist Party of China, the forerunner of the People's Liberation Army, to evade the pursuit of the Kuomintang (KMT or Chinese Nationalist Party) army. There was not just one Long March, but a series of marches, as various Communist armies in the south escaped to the north and west. The best known is the march from Jiangxi province which began in October 1934 and ended in Yan'an, Shaanxi province in October 1935. The First Front Army of the Chinese Soviet Republic, led by an inexperienced military commission, was on the brink of annihilation by Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek's troops in their stronghold in Jiangxi province. The Communists, under the eventual command of Mao Zedong and Zhou Enlai, escaped in a circling retreat to the west and north, which reportedly traversed over 9,000 kilometres (5,600 mi) over 370 days. The route passed through some of the most difficult terrain of western China by traveling west, then north, to Shaanxi.

Key moments in the Long March are highlighted in these off set printed maxi cards and stamps.
  - The Long March / 120 fen
  - The Zunyi Conference / 120 fen
  - Crossing the Chishui River Four Times / 120 fen
  - Crossing of Snow Mountains and Grasslands / 120 fen
  - Union of the Three Armies / 150 fen
  - Remembering the Beginning and Continuing the New Long March / 150 fen

Values in set: 6
Date of issue: 22 October 2016
Denomination: 780 fen
Designer: Shen Yaoyi
Size of stamps: 50 x 30 mm
Perforation: 13

Printing process: Offset
Printing House: Henan Provincal Post Printing Works

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ROYAL MAIL (UK) in May 2021 issued a Presentation Park on The Wars of the Roses. The Pack included eight Special Stamps by artist Graham Turner’s paintings.  The stamps depict the events between 1455 and 1487, when England was torn apart by a series of violent struggles for the throne. Historian and researcher Dr David Grummitt has detailed the series of bloody battles in a short essay that uses a Gothic font to give it an authentic feel for the period.

A The Wars of the Roses timeline features a summary of each conflict depicted on the stamps:
- Two Second Class, two First Class, two £1.70 and two £2.55 stamps presented as four horizontal se-tenant pairs.

- Second Class - Battle of Bosworth, 1485
- Second Class - Battle of Tewkesbury, 1471
- First Class - Battle of Barnet, 1471
- First Class - Battle of Edgecote Moor, 1469
- £1.70 - Battle of Towton, 1461
- £1.70 - Battle of Wakefield, 1460
- £2.55 - Battle of Northampton, 1460
- £2.55 - First Battle of St Albans, 1455

 

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United Nations Postal Authority Centenary Anniversary of First Manned Flight

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The selected motif represented on the stamp is from one of the oldest known maps of the Upper Rhine Valley. It was probably drawn around 1620 by Swiss cartographer and engineer Hans Conrad Gyger (1599-1674). The watercolour pen and ink drawing shows the catchment area of the Rhine between the Swiss districts of Altstätten and Bad Ragaz with the castles and palaces existing at that time. 

Liechtenstein Post 500 Years First World Circumnavigation by Ferdinand Magallan

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Raphael painted the fresco (shown in this maxi card)  "The School of Athens" for Pope Julius II between 1510 and 1511 in the "Stanza della Segnatura" of the Vatican, the original room where documents were signed within the Papal apartments. The painting, which is about 7.7 metres wide, shows a monumental interior in which a gathering of eminent scientists and philosophers from the Antiquity to the Renaissance is taking place. The title of the painting refers to the outstanding philosophical school of thought of ancient Greece. In the spirit of the Renaissance, the fresco celebrates ancient thought as the origin of European culture, its philosophy and sciences. 

Liechtenstein Post 500th Anniversary of the Death of Leonardo da Vinci

LIECHTENSTEIN POST in 2019  issued a first day cover stamp marking the 500th Anniversary of the Death of Leonardo da Vinci, one of the most famous universal scholars of all time. The Italian Leonardo da Vinci went down in history as a painter, sculptor and architect as well as a mechanic, engineer, anatomist and natural philosopher. 

The special block commemorating the anniversary of his death consisted of three stamps with the drawings "Flying Machine" (face value: CHF 1.30), "Self-Portrait" (face value: CHF 2.20) and "Anatomic Studies" (face value: CHF 2.80), gives an idea of da Vinci's extensive and visionary work. 

Even as a child, Leonardo liked to explore the laws of nature. His father sent him to the workshop of the Florentine sculptor and painter Andrea del Verrocchio for training. Da Vinci's numerous works of art, including paintings such as "Mona Lisa" and "The Last Supper", made him one of the leading artists of the Renaissance. But again and again he devoted himself to his other interests too: He dissected more than thirty corpses and made precise anatomical drawings of them. His passion for flying devices was not merely theoretical either. Among other things, he constructed a forerunner of the helicopter.

Latvia Post Miscellaneous Stamps

 

Danmark Posr Miscellaneous Stamps

 

Australia Post Historic Post Offices

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Australia Post 75th Anniversary of Amateur Radio, The Wireless Institute of Australia

AUSTRALIA POST in 1985 issued a first day cover of a printed stamp and cachet on stamped envelope marking the 75th anniversary of Amateur Radio, The Wireless Institute of Australia (WIA), 1910. Interestingly, it is a print, not a traditional stamp per se. An Australian amateur radio operator gifted this particular FDC to me knowing I am collector of  radio related stamps.  

Australia Post 50th Anniversary of Australian Broadcasting Corporation

AUSTRALIA POST in 1982 issued a first day cover stamp marking the 50th anniversary of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Many of these ABC commemorative FDCs were signed by staff personnel of the ABC radio stations in each State. This particular FDC is sans signature(s)..

 

Israel Postal Authority Miscellaneous Stamps

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Israel Postal Authority World Stamp Exhibition 1985

ISRAEL POSTAL AUTHORITY in 1985 issued a series of stamps marking the World Stamp Exhibition in Tel Aviv. Shown here are three souvenir sheets in this series featuring archeological artifacts from Ottoman, Jewish and Crusader era Jerusalem, front page of Genesis from the Schocken Bible of 1290 and Muslim, Jewish and Christian landmarks in Jerusalem.

 

Israel Postal Authority Chagall 12 Tribes of Israel Windows

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The stamps depict the Twelve Tribes of Israel. Each has a value of 1.00 Israeli Pounds.  On the tab is inscribed, in Hebrew and in English, ‘Tribes of Israel’, followed by the name of the tribe, also ‘Chagall Windows – Hadassah, Jerusalem’.  Along with these details is a tiny farmhouse in each window that is a Chagall “trademark” recalling Vitebsk in Russia, where the artist was born.

Jacob is said to have had twelve sons by four women, his wives, Leah and Rachel, and his concubines, Bilhah and Zilpah, who were, in order of their birth, Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Issachar, Zebulun, Joseph, and Benjamin, all of whom became the heads of their own family groups, hence  the Twelve Tribes of Israel.

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USSR POST in 1979 issued a series of  first day cover stamps for the 1980 Moscow Olympics featuring the gymnastics artwork of Ivan Akimovich Sushchenko. Shown here are five of the gymnastic events. All FDCs are numbered on the reverse side of the envelope.

Transkei Post Culture of Xhosa People

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The Xhosa are a Nguni ethnic group in Southern Africa whose homeland is primarily within the modern-day Eastern Cape.